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I’m thankful for the order of our children.

I’ll always remember the drive away from the hospital with our first newborn. Me sitting in the back to protect Mookie from imminent danger, reminding my husband to turn the music down(off) to protect her from going deaf permanently before we reached the interstate.  Why were all of the certifiably-expert hospital staff allowing us to leave?  We were still the same kids who came in three days ago minus the sculpted stomach and screams of pain.  We were still the same newlyweds who had been playing house for the last year and half and who had spent the last several months alternating between absolute petrification over the idea of parenthood and ignoring all of those fears and focusing on collecting the right gear and making pretty colors for the nursery.

The next two years found us in all of the expected trials-breastfeeding, sleepless nights, cry or not to cry, spank or not to spank, and daily phone calls to my at-work husband to make sure he understood what insanity was happening in my life minute by minute while his was still clocking along like it did before, no big surprises.

But, really, Mookie did exactly what the books that we clung to told us she should do.  She thrived under a perfect little schedule, slept through the night while my friends were still greeting their babies multiple times, and responded to our chosen modes of training by the textbook.  Our confidence(and pride) grew as she was the one toddler in the play group who stayed away from the stairs when told to, kept her food on the tray, and kept her fits to a minimum.  Don’t get me wrong, I had weekly and bi-weekly phone calls to my friend for advice, and I questioned what I was doing all the time and but it seemed like with enough perseverance we were good at this parenting thing.  I’ll always remember those first few years when I could  pull back my shoulders and look proudly at the pleasant and well-disciplined daughter created strictly by our hands and not related at all to her personality.  Thank goodness for the wisdom of books, I thought to myself.

I’ll also always remember how quickly all of the confidence ended, for it was only a year and half later that the Lord allowed that rug to be pulled right from under our prideful parenting shoes.

From the beginning of life with our second child, she didn’t seem to plug into the formula.  First, with four surgeries in the first year and half, our “cry yourself to sleep” and train early methods didn’t exactly fit our new scenario.  But we tried really hard, because we had a living 3 year old proof of our past success right next to her baby sister.

It was only after a few years of parenting Jellybean that we realized that, yes, our consistency with Mookie had certainly been effective, but she was also, by nature, a rule-following, parent pleasing child.  She had her share of rebellion and attitudes, but generally once she was pointed in the right direction, she followed with almost a relief at being shown the right way.

On the other hand, when Jellybean was three and I tried to talk to her about a choice she made, the common response from her was to turn from me and refuse to speak or acknowledge me-at all. Silence.  This isn’t the way it was with Mookie, I thought to myself. When she was spanked, she responded with(exact words), “When you spank me it makes me want to do more bad things.”

And by the time she was 4 or 5 she would say, “I wish good was bad and bad was good and then it would be so much easier.”

More recently she tried this one on.

And just the other day she asked, “Why do children have to respect older adults?”  She truly wanted an explanation in order to accept this expectation of her. Judging from the challenges this week, she must still be asking why.

She’s never just accepted rules, she’s wanted to understand the why.  And it took me years to realize that trying to fit her into the same mold as Mookie was not softening her heart toward me or the Lord, but having an opposite, fossilizing effect.

And when I’m not banging my head against a wall or burning all of the books that promised me guaranteed outcomes as if only one type of child existed in the world, I’m truly thankful for this curveball.

I’m encouraged by Sally Clarkson’s writings, who discourages formula parenting and encourages a true look at the individual child and suggests that constant smack downs for childish behavoir may not be the key to every child’s heart and it’s not necessarily the way God parents my own heart.   I think He overlooks a lot of foolishness on my part in order to teach me bigger, deeper heart lessons because He can see me with such a wider lens than I can.

I want to do that with my kids.  I want to parent for the long road of their life, to capture my kids hearts not to produce really impressive behavoir that gets me admiring nods from other moms, but leaves hearts untouched.  I’d rather have kids(and myself for that matter) who are open to instruction, willing to see their sin and ask the Lord for help, and understand what it means to live by God’s grace instead of put on a good outer show.

This invites a lot of mess and not as much controlled, for-convenience-sake parenting.  It also means a willingness to admit you don’t know exactly what you’re doing, and fail, while trying to find things that work.

But I’m still grateful for the birth order that let us ease into this thing!  And I don’t have regrets about our earlier, more black and white parenting, because it fit Mookie well and gave us a strong start.

She’s still a rule follower, and she’s also most similiar to me in personality.  She already has a heart for the Lord and she teaches me so much about generosity, encouragement, and service.

Jellybean, who’s got me at the drawing board scratching my head right now, will also lead me constantly back to the Lord, will help me work hard to engage her heart and mine, and will, I pray, end up with a strong heart for the Lord and whatever and whoever she cares about because when she answers the “Why” questions for herself, she’ll be able to follow them with passion.

Who knows what challenges our 3rd and 4th child will bring?!

One heart at a time, starting with mine.

Absence
of me,
Here.

A short break broken into a loud, lingering
silence.

Fingers grown accustomed to short bursts of emails, awkwardly pecking to catch up with my thoughts.

No that’s not true.

It’s my thoughts that are awkward, chaotic, jammed like a stuck elevator and cluttered like the laundry on my bed.

Writing for me is a search for order, meaning, to the rapid input/output happening each blink of the day(and night for that matter).  My husband finds order in the beat of music.  If I’m already experiencing high traffic, music just clouds the frequency further.

But writing brings calm.  Also, like tonight, it brings dread at what I’ll find in the chaos, what’s calling out to be sorted.  But there’s a peace, a rightness, in beginning the process.

So I guess I’ll start at the beginning.

On another day.

Gotcha.

Nice to see so you again.

Dear Reader,

I’ll be taking a break until next Monday.

If you’re an Imperfect Mama just like me, you might enjoy reading Sally Clarkson’s two blog posts on parenting.

Blog Post 1
Blog Post 2

If you haven’t discovered her already, consider checking out one of her many books that offer a sense of purpose, hope, and grace for this crazy journey we call motherhood.  I recommend Mission of Motherhood, The Mom Walk, and Dancing with my Father. And her blog offers a daily dose of wisdom, truth, and encouragement.

See you next week.

I’m so glad to bring you a guest post today from this Imperfect Mama. The subject she chose to write about echoes my own thoughts in this season of full life at home with our 4 children.  I can’t wait for you to read it, so go ahead and get started.

The other day in the car, a conversation across the minivan.

Mookie: “Mommy, those girls were talking foolish and using bad words.”

Mama thought: Oh what a wise, mature girl.

“Wow, I’m glad you could recognize that and choose not to be a part of it, it’s can be pretty hard when you’re with friends.”

Jellybean: “Yeah, they were also being kind of mean to the younger kids and keeping me from playing on the slide or coming in the house.”

Mama thought: Is this the same child who pushed her brother off the bed and then left him crying quietly on the floor while she went back to sleep?

Jellybean: “Why were they acting like that?  You know how I’m all in to taking care of God’s creation and trying to make it like it used to be, well, people are God’s creation too so the way we can take care of them is for everybody to love everybody. ”

Mama thought: Ooh, what an amazing child, I’m sure she’s not the same one who hides her brother’s favorite animals and then lies about where they are, enjoying his anger and frustration.

Mama: “That’s great and you know that’s how other people are going to be able to tell how there is something different about your heart, by how you love people.”

Jellybean: “Mama-”

Mama thought: I wonder what wonderfully deep thing she’ll say next.

Mama: Yeah?

Jellybean: “Do crocodiles loose their teeth?”

Giggles, chuckling, the baby starts laughing with us.

Oh that’s right, she’s 7 years old.  I’m 32 and I still have a lot to learn about loving people.  And the dental health of a crocodile.

Two children and two girls into motherhood, and then-a boy.  By then the excitement of getting to try out a boy had given way to fear.  ”I know girls, what in the world will I do with a boy, and my goodness, aren’t clothes for boys so boring?”

My friend Beth looked me in the eye, “I love my girl, but I am in love with my boy.  Just wait.”

How many times I’ve repeated that statement to my friends expecting their first boy, the same look in my eye.  I’m in love with this little, big man.

The third child, the only boy, let’s just say he gets a way with things sometimes. Did I mention he’s a serious kisser? I mean he can let loose with the kisses and the hugs. To the point that his sisters start rolling their eyes and sighing, “Why does he have to talk about kissing you all the time?” One day they’ll understand. I’m not putting any stops to it until, inevitably, it happens on it’s own.

On the other hand, I really want this little man to become a strong, Godly, father and husband.  Which he be may if he’s able to survive his sisters.

This weekend marked his fifth year with our family.  For this first half-decade, he’s gotten along pretty well as the little brother and the super sweet son.  This year he got promoted to big brother and demoted from being the baby in the house(though the boy thing still works in his favor).  Little by little he’s coming into his own-we’ll watch with interest as he creates an identity separate from “brother of 3 sisters”.

But for now, keep the kisses coming little, big man.

“I’m going to be a daddy soon,” said the Boy on the morning of his birthday.

This is new.

Baby finds her doll.

Baby picks up doll.

Baby puts thumb in mouth.

It happens every time.

And I fall for this little one even more.  Is that even possible?

“Smash!”

I know the source of the sound without looking(or atleast one half of the crash), the sweet blond head of Drummer Boy has once again made contact with a corner of a table or a door handle, maybe the edge of the bathroom sink.  Earlier in the day he stepped on the point of a playmobile sword, and I can’t remember how the bruise come to his knee before I rose from bed.

“I need a band-aid mom.”

It turned out to be the corner of the sink this time.  We’ve been here before with the other kids.  Around this age their bodies are like one of those quick grow capsules that bursts into a foam animal five times the original size when placed in water.  The sudden growth always means collateral damage.

“Buddy, I know what we need.  We need to cover youre entire body and head with band-aids so that the next time you fall you won’t get hurt.”

He giggled and forgot about the pain momentarily. Secretly I wondered if we should go ahead and try the band-aid plan.

For a while now I’ve been walking with people in my life who are experiencing painful circumstances, a change from the many periods of my life when I was the one needing a healing hand. In my own life, I’ve held my 4 day old baby before open-heart surgery, and I’ve been on the receiving end of the full brunt of mental illness in a parent.

Undoubtedly my own experiences have made me more empathetic to someone else’s suffering, but a while back it all reached a point when I was no longer walking beside these people but instead swimming away from a growing tsunami of hurt as it spread over me, my friend, and several of my family members.  Through their pain transfused to me, I was losing vision.  It wasn’t that my faith was in danger, but I couldn’t see the end of the suffering with my finite perspective.  I remember telling a friend, “I’m okay, but if someone asked me to explain why it’s okay for these people to be hurting so badly right now, I couldn’t explain it to anybody.” Even though I didn’t realize it then, I was out of band-aids.  And more than that I was ready to start wrapping myself in gauze, or maybe a full body cast, to create a buffer from everyone else’s pain.

Several years ago my dad’s mental illness(of which I had been unaware) abruptly took it’s true shape, erasing aspects of the father I thought I had finally gained post-childhood. I remember reaching out to my best friend and she pulled away from me leaving me hurt and confused, wondering why she wasn’t there to listen when I most needed her.  Later we talked through it and I tried to understand her point of view.  But it wasn’t until I walked in her shoes, feeling and seeing these people break and being helpless to change anything for them, that I really understood how she felt. It was then that I could see that because she cared for me, it was hard not to let her anger and hurt for my circumstances paralyze her own life.  And each time I shared more with her it brought further realization that she couldn’t do anything to stop what I was experiencing.  She needed to step back, give herself permission to take breaks and feel the sweet(and tough) moments of her own life, and she eventually found a way to give me support in the water without my circumstances drowning us both.

The last few years I’ve been trying to develop a tradition of Lent in my life.  A period of searching my heart, understanding the bottomless nature of my sin and how I participated in the pain heaped on Jesus that long ago friday(and I don’t just mean the nails, but the pain of the sin itself).  But none of the carefully thought out practices I’ve found in my google search have made a connection to my heart. Instead, the infiltration of pain from 3 people in my life has shown me a lot more than easter traditions.  I think about a recent moment when my breaths labored to be released and all the goodness around me seemed dim, reduced.  The pain of the three people I cared about cloaked everything in my life.  Three people, and I could barely tolerate it.

Then there is Jesus.

I found myself reading a story this week that I’ve read over and over again for 9 years to my children, but this time it sounded different.

“Papa?” Jesus cried, frantically searching the sky.  ”Papa? Where are you? Don’t leave me!”

And for the first time-and the last-when he spoke, nothing happened.  Just a horrible, endless silence.  God didn’t answer.  He turned away from his Boy.

Even though it was midday, a dreadful darkness covered the face of the world.  …The earth trembled and quaked. The great mountains shook…Until it seemed that the whole world would break.  That creation itself would tear apart.

The full force of the storm of God’s fierce anger at sin was coming down.  On his own Son.  Instead of his people.  It was the only way God could destroy sin, and not destroy his children whose hearts were filled with sin.

Then Jesus shouted, “It is finished!”

“Father!” Jesus cried.  ”I give you my life.” And with a great sigh he let himself die.

“Mommy, I didn’t know that all of the sin went on Jesus, I thought it just vanished.”

Yes, all of it.  Not from three people, or fifty, or twenty thousand, but a number that might as well be the sum of all the sands on the shore for what I’m able to comprehend of it.  And Jesus did nothing to prevent or limit the pain.  And neither did his Father.

Thanks you, Jesus, that you were broken for me, and thank you for breaking me to know you.

I came across A Path Made Straight on one of those late night blog binges. You know what I mean. By the time I found it I had a running list of all the ways I could be a better mom-better art projects, dress the kids in cuter outfits, take up knitting. As I read her blog I didn’t find myself adding to the list.  Shoulders and neck loosening, the main words that came to mind, “Yes, exactly.” Her day sounded like my day, messy. And what I loved best was that even on the very far from perfect day, I could tell Mama Hooper still wanted to get up each morning and be with her kids, come what may.  She seemed to want what I wanted, a little more grace each day, transforming my heart to then transfuse it to my children.

Thanks for openly confessing that you’re an Imperfect Mama.

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